subject: Strength Training Without Weights [print this page] Your home exercise equipment can be very economical while still being effective. You do not require any weight-lifting equipment at all for strength training, just your own body weight and a few pieces of plastic.
The human body provides considerable variety with its variously weighted limbs and its joints that allow a near boundless number of movement possibilities. Directed and repeated movements of simply your body can provide all the strength training you desire. But to move your body with comfort and safety, you should purchase a good workout mat. Cushioning makes most of the prone and seated activity a lot more comfortable. Try to find a mat that's at least 3/8 inch thick. The thin yoga mats may be convenient to roll up and stick under your arm for transport, but they are not thick enough to pad your body effectively.
There are many online resources for "body only" strength workouts. Make sure to examine the qualifications of the provider. You can find as many video clips as you want from certified physical trainers and physical therapists. If something hurts--you know the contrast between working muscles and real pain--stop! Strength training should not cause pain.
You're likely to get bored only working with your own body, and boredom could lead you to stop working out. So here is where simple resistance bands or tubes show up. These rainbow-colored bands add resistance between limbs, or can be attached to a door knob or a grip bar. They greatly increase the diversity of your workouts, and the allow you to go on increasing the resistance to match your increasing strength. The bands grow in strength as the shade gets darker. This means you can go a very long way in getting to your strength training objectives with only these light, very affordable, easily stored bands. You can find them at any decent sporting goods shop or on the web. Hang them on light plastic hooks to avoid tangles.
A fitness ball makes a final, low priced piece of home exercise equipment. Pick one that permits you sit on it with flat feet. A fitness ball intensifies your body-only exercises. You will be amazed at the increased difficulty of a push-up started with your feet on an unstable round surface. Your core stability and your balance will both be dramatically challenged, and improved.
A buying hint: get the ball with a pump, extra plugs (in case you damage one trying to re-inflate a flat ball) and the guide booklet or DVD. These extras will make life with your fitness ball a challenge--not an aggravation. (Note: a bicycle pump even with a "ball needle" will not work.)
"Pumping Plastic!" just doesn't have the stature carried by "pumping iron." But it is equally effective, much less pricey, and much less space-consuming than iron for your home exercise equipment. Eat your iron--don't pump it.
